Tag Archives: electronic music

Void Vision • Crashfaster • SSD Engage • Party Time! Hexcellent! @8STATIC 31 on 1/12/13

Live chip music experience by emily k feder
8static banner.

On January 12th we celebrated the first fantastic 8static of 2013 and pulled no punches in doing so! The show was not only mostly comprised of national musical acts like Crashfaster and SSD Engage, but also the visualist (a personal favorite of mine), Party Time! Hexcellent!, came all the way from Austin, TX!!

8static 31 - crowd
Photo by Majorie Becker of Chiptography

I knew we were in for a good night when, less than 30 minutes after doors had opened, the place was already packed with people! I looked over at the entrance line to see an entire group of friendly faces that had came from NYC and my night had already been made. People from all over the region were had shown up from places such as NYC, Cincinnati, Kentucky, Virginia, Seattle & Baltimore; many hoping to do open mic. Rather than turn away such a great talent pool, the open mic was extended to one hour and it turned out to be one of the best to date! One highlight was the fantastic southern rock hybrid teamup from Kentucky of Solarbear & Mr. Wimmer (who had incited the crowd into demanding he get off the stage shortly before he began playing)


But it didn’t end there, we were treated to plenty of other national guests showcasing different styles! (click the artist’s name to see the video of their performance!) Firedrill came all the way from Seattle and Tony Ness shared an awesome new rap. Kentucky’s Mr. Wimmer made all the ladies swoon with his Roy Orbison-inspired song and Inverse Phase got everyone singing with his cover of Information Society’s “what’s on your mind?” on the POKEY chip. 17 year old newcomer, MiLs DJ, played his second live song ever and introduced to his latest choreographed dance routine, the brick breaker! (“it’s easy to learn!”) NYC’s favorite dragon, Fumu Battleship, brought us some noisy nanoloop music & Ro-bear debuted a beautiful new LSDJ song on his gameboy, ending the open mic perfectly.

After that fantastic open mic the stage was cleared to make room for our first main performer, SSD Engage, coming off their excellent recent release, “Nostalgia Paradigm“. SSD Engage is a trio from Cincinnati comprised of S.P.R.Y., Sp00ked and Disabletron in which they make improvisational dance grooves with two Gameboys and a MPC1000 sampler (for drums). These guys did a fantastic job and are serious emerging talent to keep an eye on this upcoming year!!

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Next up was Crashfaster from San Francisco. Having just come off an amazing performance at MAGFest 11 and finishing up with their East Coast tour here at 8static. The last time Crashfaster played 8static, two years prior, it was a one-man show; now expanded to four members and definitely benefitting from that decision. Their musical style sounds like it has roots in electronic industrial / EBM music with intense vocals heavily distorted by a vocoder plus guitar player, live drummer and beautiful backup vocals by the lovely Keiko Takamura. Starting the set off with a fantastic cover of Nine Inch Nail‘s, “Closer” (performed by special request for 8static) they tore into their regular set and brought the house down. Their set ended with a cover of Weezer’s party time favorite, “Say it ain’t so“, that literally had the entire audience singing!

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Void Vision is a well-established name in Philadelphia outside the chip scene through coldwave & darkwave circles. It had been a couple years since she last performed at 8static and, being a recovering goth myself, I was pretty excited to see her play again. Void Vision plays with an assortment of vintage synthesizers and gear all while singing. Part of the enjoyment of the performance is knowing that the setup is old school and more challenging than using modern gear. Shari may play hauntingly dark music and sing heartbreaking lyrics, but her intimate set and candid, down to earth personality drew the audience in even closer as she manually loaded and prepped each component of gear between songs. She also played a few songs arranged on LSDJ which, complemented by her amazing voice, ended the night perfectly!

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Want more??
The complete show, in it’s entirety, can be watched on this playlist via Chip Music Chronicle:
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by emfedex
content curated by emily k feder

Check out more videos on Chip Music Chronicle;
documenting the live chip music scene since 2010!

Chiptography‘s photo journal of the show can be found HERE!:

8static is philadelphia’s monthly chip music event; held the second saturday each month. Keep up to date with future 8static shows at:
http://8static.com

If you were also at the show or enjoyed this recap, please share your experience or feeling in the comments below!

The History of the World’s Most Important Music Loop

This fascinating, brilliant 20-minute video narrates the history of the “Amen Break,” a six-second drum sample from the b-side of a chart-topping single from 1969. This sample was used extensively in early hiphop and sample-based music, and became the basis for drum-and-bass and jungle music — a six-second clip that spawned several entire subcultures. Nate Harrison’s 2004 video is a meditation on the ownership of culture, the nature of art and creativity, and the history of a remarkable music clip.

Chiptune Daft Punk “Something About Us” by Dj CUTMAN

Art by SudarioJust released a new remix I’ve been working on for the past few days. An 8-bit re-imagined version of “Something About Us” from Daft Punk’s album “Discovery,” possibly one of my favorite electronic albums of all time. Something about the way Daft Punk incorporated vocals into this album really stuck with me, and when a friend of mine did a hip-hop remix of this tune I knew I had to follow suit, taking it in a different direction.

The mix is available on Bandcamp.

I slowed the track down from the original, and utalized a very fun plug-in called The Magical 8-bit PlugIn, engineered by Japanese band YMCK. It’s simple controls allowed me to explore the most basic of the chiptune sounds (square, triangle, pulse and noise waves) while giving me freedom to focus on the mix and arrangement of the piece.

The total song is 16 tracks, 8 Chiptune tracks, 6 Sample tracks (for drums and vocals) and 2 sends for compression (to thicken the drums) and delay. I used Waves L1 and The Glue to master. A simpler mastering chain than I normally use, because I was going for a more authentic chiptune sound. Those true chip enthusiasts out there would criticize that this isn’t a “Chiptune” because this mix could never have come out of a single sound chip. But if you know me, I’m a production junkie. Screw the rules, man, I’m making music!

Something About Us [8-Bit Daft Punk Remix] by Dj CUTMAN

The track is also available from Bandcamp, for those who wish to support or just download it in a high quality format. The FLAC version sounds awesome (if I do say so myself :) You can also follow Dj CUTMAN on Facebook, Twitter, and Soundcloud.

The art was created by Sudario from Brazil.

REFORMAT THE PLANET Trailer

NYC Filmmakers 2Player Productions have spent the last three years documenting the underground Chiptune community, culminating in the release of their feature-length DVD, REFORMAT THE PLANET. Lots of great looking footage from BlipFest. I’m not even going to front like I know a lot about this project, I just stumbled upon the trailer and got so excited I needed to make a post. Not a want, a need to post on my blog. For more (actual) information, visit this post on motherboard by Zen_Albatross, or just watch the trailer:

www.2playerproductions.com

AVAILABLE on DVD August 24th, 2010

PRE-ORDER TODAY!
http://fangamer.net/products/rtp-dvd

..::Official Selection::..
-South by Southwest Film Festival 08 (world premiere)
-Melbourne International Film Festival 08
-Penny Arcade Expo 08
-International Amsterdam Film Festival 08
-CPH:DOX Copenhagen International Documentary Film Festival 08
-Montreal Pop Festival ’09
-Fantastic Fest ’10
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REFORMAT THE PLANET is a feature length documentary which delves into the movement known as chip tunes, a vibrant underground scene based around creating new, original music using old video game hardware. Familiar devices such as the Nintendo Game Boy and Nintendo Entertainment System are pushed in new directions with startling results.

Using New York as a microcosm for a larger global movement, “Reformat the Planet” maps out the genesis of the first annual Blip Festival, a four day celebration of over 30 international artists exploring the untapped potential of low-bit video game consoles. With floor-stomping rhythms and fist-waving melodies, trailblazers of the chip tune idiom descend upon Manhattan to pen a new chapter in the history of electronic music.

The trailer features music by Nullsleep (“Salvation for a Broken Heart”, “On Target”), Martin Galway (“The Neverending Story”), and Random (“Micawber’s Moan”), all composed on classic video game consoles.